[SPOILER] Ikhanbod

[Ichabod]

Here's my new city of Sentenza:

As you can see, even with the Citrus happiness, I'm still with only +2 happy faces. I need to improve my gems soon and I'll need to quickly buy and improve the silver tile once my 3rd city is settled. Azza already has 2 salt resources, so i'm considering offering him gems for salt as soon as I get my first gems improved. I'll take a bit longer to improve my second and third gems, since they need BW, but I'll start building friendly relationships with Azza and securing a trade for later. I can cancel the trade if my 4th city goes by the salt as planned too. The early happiness won't make that much of a difference for Azza. Surplus happy is worth almost nothing in Civ 5, except GA points, which can be harmful (you don't want GAs so early, I'd think).

New city helped my capital, allowing me to work the 4 food banana tile for quicker growth. I think I'll have to build a WB after the archer, which means finishing sailing. Why? Because otherwise I'll have to stop growth from the capital and second city in order not to go into unhapiness when I get my third city. I don't want that. WB are disgustingly expensive in this game, more than a trirreme. But they are worth 4 happiness + 1 food, I guess. Notice that I'll get 2 food when the wheat farm is ready, since the 10% food on capital will become a full number.

Second city goes for granary. It has a lot of bananas tiles, so it'll get a lot of food from it. I'll probably delay the improvement of the bananas tiles, since it take so long and it'll probably just give me a hammer on the tile. Similar to my city center, I believe the bananas tiles are plains tiles - as you can see, I only have 2 food on the city center, not three. That's unfortunate.

Demos aren't bad:

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I have so much to build right now and so little production. I need workers, a WB, units and buildings (this shows the power of tradition - the free monuments are worth a lot when everything is so expensive)... After the WB, I'll probably get a second worker in the capital (and I think I'll try to buy anotehr one after I buy the settler). I'm only buying the settler for my third city because I have good unimproved tiles for city 2 and 3 to work (the 3 food tiles). Otherwise, I'd probably have gone for a worker buy first.

Techwise I see that I need to finish sailing and get BW. I don't think Pindicator is up for a rush, his starting land sucks and his demos aren't good too. I think he can be gunning for The Hanging Gardens, which would make his capital powerful, giving the food that it lacks. That'd be a good strategy. I can't afford wonders right now, so don't expect to see my building one.

Back to tech, BW is needed for me to improve my tiles. I have a favourable diplomatic situation that I'm the only one who met Serdoa, so any duplicate resources he gets will be traded with me, most likely. So, I need to improve my spare gems ASAP, eyeing a trade with Serdoa and one with Azza (Azza for salt).

After that, I really don't know. I'll beeline Civil Service for the passive food bonus and because it's a prereq of Chivalry and my Keshiks. There isn't anything interesting in the Tech Tree right now, at least for my civ. Of course I'd love some wonders, but I can't compete with Marble/Aristocracy/Egypt, so that's out. So, CS it is, going through HR first to start building Mounted units (for defense + City State interactions), probably Math-Currency next (Writing first?) and then Drama and Poetry. My tech rate will be nice, because my cities are growing big!

This is a pic of Pindicator's dry land:

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Regarding City States: Luckily, all the city states I've met have resources that I don't own (albeit 2 of them have dyes). They are also lined up pretty well for me to conquest them. Ah, if only city conquest wasn't so damn harmful in Civ 5. The closest city to me is probably the one worth more as an ally, due to it being maritime. But, I'll choose which CS to ally with through their quests, not through strategic placement. That's because I can't afford the gold to ally with them, but I can afford to clear barbs and the like.

The city states give me a choice of early Keshik warring without having to worry about attacking a neighbour (remember that my UA gives bonus vs. CSs). It's a choice, rather than a must, but it's nice to have choices. I can't wage war with them earlier, I think, because Horsemen suck as a unit, but they suck way more to capture cities. I won't have CBs too and I don't think Archers cut it. Besides, horsemen upgrade into Keshiks, but since one is a mounted unit and the other is a ranged one, their promotions don't match. I think they still give the effects, but not the upgrade path, so I'll be further away from March promo with upgraded Keshiks, which I don't want.

I think my position is pretty good. I have room for 4 cities (counting my already settled ones) with the trategic resources I need (horses) + exclusive luxuries - exactly the number of cities that get Tradition Bonuses. There's a 5th possible city that grabs Ivory too, albeit it's further away. My expansion prospects through war, be it CSs or players, also have unique happiness resources. So, I think things are looking up. I just need to keep expanding + saving hammers for only the most important things, while building some horses to improve to Keshiks when I reach the beelined Chivalry. I think adding Pindi's bad start + his Social Policies choices (aristocracy rather than Legalism) + his UU being early while my UU dominates mid game will make him my desired target when the time comes.

We'll see...

[BRickAstley]

I think adding Pindi's bad start + his Social Policies choices (aristocracy rather than Legalism) + his UU being early while my UU dominates mid game will make him my desired target when the time comes.

We'll see...

hammer

I would offer more commentary but my CiV knowledge is lean, so i dont have any suggestions or opinions to share, but i enjoy your reports and look forward to seeing the mongols wipe the earth clean.

[Ichabod]

I think adding Pindi's bad start + his Social Policies choices (aristocracy rather than Legalism) + his UU being early while my UU dominates mid game will make him my desired target when the time comes.

We'll see...

hammer

I would offer more commentary but my CiV knowledge is lean, so i dont have any suggestions or opinions to share, but i enjoy your reports and look forward to seeing the mongols wipe the earth clean.

Thanks, BRick.

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Turn 29 was pretty calm on the domestic front. I spotted Pindicator's settler.

That worried me. It seemed Pindicator was going to build a no-happy resource city next to Sentenza, stealing tiles that my city could get. In Civ 5, once you get tiles, you don't lose them anymore, except by your opponents using Great People (as far as I know). So, he could very well steal the horses I was after. That prompted a defensive measure, buying tiles.

I bought the sheep and the horse tile for 65 gold. It'll delay my second settler, but that's not that much of a problem, since I wouldn't have the needed happiness for it for some time. Buying those tiles wasn't optimal, but I couldn't afford not to do it. Now, Pindicator has a difficult decision to take. Let's take a look at how the land looks right now:

I don't know where his settler is going right now. He can get a city near the wheat, but that won't be a good one. One of those foodplains will be claimed by my Capital in the next turn, so that city wouldn't have anywhere to grow to. Maybe he'll try to claim the Salt resource which I plan to make my 4th city. Well, he can do it, but I'll cut his empire in half if he does and that's not very safe. I'll wait his moves.

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Almost size 6, which is pretty good. I'll improve the wheat, than the gems, than farm the fp. Harmonica will keep growing. Pindicator's capital is size 3 in comparision. He had no tile with more than 1 food in his first "circle" of tiles. That was really bad...

My neighbours are going bankrupt! That's probably overbuilding buildings + no river start (hhoray for free monument!). I'm in a pretty confortable gold situation, fortunately. While the gold decreases for my neighbours, I'll soon be able to aford a 370 gold settler, enabling a new city while my capital grows. Things are actually starting to fit. I'll have my next social policy close to the time of my 3rd city and it'll give me more gold and happiness, as can be seen below:

That's 3 gold and 3 happiness in two turns. Soon to be 4 too, I think. Depending on what happens, maybe I settle the salt as my 3rd city or the silver one. Buying the settler means I can choose what city he comes from, which is pretty nice.

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Capital finished an archer. 3 barbs appeared close to it when I finished the turn, showing that it was a good decision. I think I'm going for a watermill next, +2 food and +1 production. I'll think about it. Monarchy + gems + the delayed 3rd city means I can delay the WB from the capital to improve the Pearls. Watermill would help the snowball. Another worker/archer/warrior could also help...

[Ichabod]

By the way, my Civ's border look so bad right now...

[T-hawk]

That's 3 gold and 3 happiness in two turns. Soon to be 4 too, I think.

Are you asking which way Monarchy's benefits round when the capital is at an odd size? Gold rounds down. Anger savings functionally rounds up (skipping the technical details.) So you'll get an extra happy but not an extra gold at size 7, then an extra gold but not happy at size 8.

[Ichabod]

That's 3 gold and 3 happiness in two turns. Soon to be 4 too, I think.

Are you asking which way Monarchy's benefits round when the capital is at an odd size? Gold rounds down. Anger savings functionally rounds up (skipping the technical details.) So you'll get an extra happy but not an extra gold at size 7, then an extra gold but not happy at size 8.

The "I think" was more directed at my expected growth time to reach size 8, but that's is very important information. Thanks, T-Hawk. I was assuming I'd only get the 4th happy at size 8. This is pretty good news for me.

[Rowain]

In Civ 5, once you get tiles, you don't lose them anymore, except by your opponents using Great People (as far as I know).

Great Generals to be precise. (In vanilla Great Artist were the tile-stealers)

[T-hawk]

Since you say it's important, I'll fill in the technical details too. Anger is tracked including decimals. Monarchy works by halving anger from the capital's citizens (not by adding happy, despite the in-game description.) So at size 7 a Monarchy capital produces 3.5 anger. But the civ-wide check for happiness is done with integers: if you have 10 happy and 10.5 anger civ-wide, that is OK, counts as 0 happy not -1 unhappy for the empire. So the result is as if the anger savings rounds up. That last doesn't hold exactly true once some other fractional anger modifier comes into play (Meritocracy, Forbidden Palance, India's UA) but it does in the early game with just Monarchy.

[Ichabod]

Since you say it's important, I'll fill in the technical details too. Anger is tracked including decimals. Monarchy works by halving anger from the capital's citizens (not by adding happy, despite the in-game description.) So at size 7 a Monarchy capital produces 3.5 anger. But the civ-wide check for happiness is done with integers: if you have 10 happy and 10.5 anger civ-wide, that is OK, counts as 0 happy not -1 unhappy for the empire. So the result is as if the anger savings rounds up. That last doesn't hold exactly true once some other fractional anger modifier comes into play (Meritocracy, Forbidden Palance, India's UA) but it does in the early game with just Monarchy.

Thanks, T-Hawk.

Here's another question. Buildings seems to be more expensive to buy with gold compared to units, in a gold per hammer ratio. What's your thoughts about buying buildings, though? Is it worth it? I'm basically asking about early game here, considering more limited resources.

[T-hawk]

Settlers and workers always take precedence over buildings, as long as you need more of either. Buying settlers lets you bypass the non-growth time and bad food:hammer conversion, and buying a worker in a new city saves its travel time from an older city.

The first buildings I buy are often aqueducts, which are a good gold:hammer conversion at only 4:1, and pay back pretty quickly. Then universities or opera houses depending on victory condition (both primarily for the specialist slots for GPP), although there's also research agreements and city-states competing for my dollars.

I only play vs AIs so I never have to buy military units, so can't lend any insight there. :) Although buying an archer or two can be acceptable, they're 5:1 gold:hammer which isn't terrible, and sometimes the archer could recoup a fraction of its cost by preventing a pillage. And I suppose buying a unit to steal a CS or AI worker is all positive.